


Our Little Forever

by Fishyz9, imaginentertain



Category: Days of Our Lives
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-01
Updated: 2014-06-01
Packaged: 2018-02-03 01:03:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1725503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fishyz9/pseuds/Fishyz9, https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginentertain/pseuds/imaginentertain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The result of a WilSon round robin with beautifulhigh (tumblr)/ imaginentertain (AO3). following Gabi's (soon to be) arrest.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Our Little Forever

It’s late when I get home and the apartment is already dark.  Feels cold.  They’re already in bed so I try not to disturb them too much.  I navigate by the light from my cell phone at first, but after I stub my toe on the couch I brave a small lamp.

There’s some food left out on the side for me but I’m not that hungry so I can’t bring myself to eat it.  It’s not much; just a sandwich.  Probably made as an afterthought once Will and Ari had eaten.

That’s us at the moment.  Afterthoughts.

I shower quickly, dry off in the bathroom.  Feels good to be clean, washing the day away.  It wasn’t a busy night; things in the town seem to be rather subdued.  I know how they feel.  My sleepwear is already in the bathroom, warming on the radiator.

Maybe not so much of an afterthought.

When I come out of the bathroom I see the box for the first time.  Not quite sure how I missed it when I came in, but there it is.  I know what’s in it; we talked about this for days.  Well, Will did.  Fresh start and all that.

I think it’s too soon.  I think we need time to process what’s gone on, what’s happened between us.

I grab a bottle of water from the fridge and I head for bed, pushing the door shut but not closed behind me.  I want to be able to hear, just in case there’s anything to hear.

The bedside lamp glows softly and I switch it off as I get in.  An afterthought.  The bed is cold and I wrap the covers around me in an attempt to stay warm.

He’ll say the same thing he said before: that he fell asleep settling her, that he was in and out so much that it was easier.  Except the book is missing from the nightstand and his side of the bed hasn’t even been touched.

See?  Will not sleeping in our room, in our bed, since Gabi was sent down?  Not so much of an afterthought.

**oOo**

I’m supposed to be good with my words, being a writer and all, but I don’t know what to say to him. There’s this divide between us now, not so wide that I can’t still feel him when he’s close or understand his every look, but when it comes to the words…there’s a divide.

He wants to talk it out, and to be fair that’s how we’ve always done things. It’s this private, unspoken promise between us now: no secrets. Communication has always been our thing, it’s why we can read each other so well, it’s how he knew that I was lying at the police station, but I can’t talk to him right now. I’m angry and I’m mad and…and I don’t want to say something that would actually hurt him, that would hit its mark and that I couldn’t take back.

One word in particular… _hypocrite_.

It’s not like I haven’t been dishonest with him in the past, I have, but that was before we were…a real _we_. I screwed up in the beginning but since then I’ve kept my word. Sonny? He dragged this secret into our marriage. While he was looking me in the eye, so happy and emotional as he said his vows, as he called me his anchor, not three feet away stood a secret that would change our lives forever.

I knew there was something. Something he couldn’t tell me about Gabi, but I figured it was between them, something personal, and that as long as they were all getting along at home then whatever that secret was could just stay in the past. I had no idea what she’d done. I would never have even occurred to me that she would be capable of something so selfish, so dangerous, and I can’t help but think that if I had been aware, if I had known about what she had done, that maybe things might be different now.

 He says he didn’t want to change who she was in my eyes, he didn’t want that tension being brought into Ari’s life, but what he doesn’t understand is that Gabi was already a different person to me than she was two years ago. Nick Fallon saw to that.

I want to lay this all at his feet and say that some people can just bring out the worst in us, but the truth is, the mess with the stalker, with Melanie? That was before my cousin came back to town. Those lives lost and that traumatized young woman, our _friend?_ That was all Gabi, all that pain and grief and for what? So she could have a boyfriend?

Perhaps that was why she couldn’t keep away from Nick; they were two peas in a pod. Kidnapping? Check. Lying? Check. Murder?

Murder?

A month ago I would have walked through fire for the mother of my child. Now I think of her and I’m…I’m disgusted. I’m disgusted by her and I feel so cheated, so _sad_. Sad for my friend who wasn’t who I thought she was for the longest time, sad for my daughter who will grow up without a mother. Sad for myself and for my husband who was dragged into this mess and who is bewildered by my silence and who deserves so much better.

I’m just so mad. At her. At him. He made excuses for her, said how she’d changed so there was no point bringing up something that would hurt me and implicate Chad if it ever got out. But I can’t let go of the thought that if I had just known back then what it was she was capable of, if I’d known what it is Nick was holding over her, then maybe I could have done something and she would be here, and Nick would be alive.

Perhaps I’m being foolish, selfish, dramatic, but it’s how I feel. I’m tied up in knots and cut off from the love of my life, even when he’s standing right in front of me. And he’s mad, too. He’s mad at me for turning myself in, for trying to take the blame, for setting him adrift, for leaving him―if only momentarily―without his anchor.

I’m too mad to explain that I wasn’t covering for Gabi, that I had no idea it was her and that I was in fact covering for him. I don’t know if he gets that, and he keeps trying to bring it up, to talk it out like we always would, but I won’t let him. I won’t let him talk about it, I won’t let him touch me, and I won’t give him forgiveness even though _nothing_ in this equation is really his fault.

Instead I’m quiet, distant even. He says we need to think ahead, to think about what to tell Ari and to plan visitations. My response? A box at the front door with her things in it, ready for the local charity store or Rafe, whoever wants her garbage can have it. But I don’t want any trace of her left in this house; I don’t want her polluting this household.

She doesn’t exist anymore.

**oOo**

I don’t think he’s sleeping either on the other side of that wall.  I don’t think he’s sleeping period.  He can’t even blame Ari anymore; she was unsettled at first, of course she was.  She clung to me or to Will as if she was scared that we’d suddenly disappear from her life.  She would whimper and cry as soon as she was down, her little arms reaching up for us.

For me.

I’ll be honest, I’m more than happy to hold her.  Maybe I’m the one being a little bit clingy but right now?  The simple fact is that I’m in Arianna’s life because of Will and while I don’t think for even a fraction of a second that Will would keep me away from her, the simple truth is that I’m away from him right now.  There’s a divide between me and my family.

Between the life I had and this one.

I can’t sleep, despite feeling tired, so I get up and head out of the room.  To do what, I don’t know, but it’s better than staring at the ceiling in an empty bedroom.

Sitting on the couch I flick through app after app on my iPad, looking for something to entertain me, to distract me, that doesn’t require too much thought.  The news app was shut down quickly; Gabi is still their story of choice.  Not only did she shoot Nick but she was going to let Will take them blame, she had history and form, she blew up half of Salem…

My name should be through those articles really.  I was part of the cover up.  I was part of the reason she did what she did.  If I’d not brought that gun into this house, if I’d not kept my mouth shut.

Now I need to open my mouth and talk to Will but I’m scared to do that.  I’m scared of what the conversation will be between us, I’m scared of what I will say to him.  I’m scared that I won’t be able to find the words to tell him that I can’t  _breathe_ without him and I feel like I’m drowning in the space that’s between us.  I want to tell him that I’m floating away and I need my anchor back.

I want to tell him that I’m sorry except I don’t think that I am.  I don’t regret what I did; I made each and every one of those choices for what I thought were the best reasons at the time.  They may not have been my most thought-out decisions, but everyone has those.

Will has one: we call her Arianna.

And she was the best mistake that anyone could make.  She is…  I would give my whole world to protect her, same as Gabi did.  She was protecting our family and that’s all I wanted to do.  Instead we’ve shattered it.

Listen to me.  Years of arguments and  _now_  I side with her?

I’m on my feet before I have even registered the sound.  My body knows, I can actually feel it when Arianna’s upset.  By the time she’s crying out I’ve opened the door to her room and I’m halfway to the crib by the time Will’s stirred.

Ari reaches for me and I lift her up so she can snuggle against my collarbone.  She fits there, she belongs there.  Just like Will belongs in my heart.

"I would have got her," Will says.

"I know," I reply, "I was up."

"So was I," he admits and for a moment we stand there, just a few feet between us as if it were the greatest divide in history.

**oOo**

I’ve missed this; I’ve missed seeing them together. It takes me a few seconds to piece it together, but with a sinking feeling in my stomach I realize that I’ve not only been keeping Sonny at an arm’s length from myself, but I’ve unintentionally kept him from Ari, his little girl.

It’s not like I’ve outright told him to keep his distance, it’s just that whenever she cries―which is a lot lately―I just beat him to it most of the time. I tell him not to worry and that I’ll settle her, and he backs off.

I have no right to do that. She is his, and not only in our minds but legally, too. See, Gabi did one good thing before she was dragged away in handcuff; she solidified Sonny’s place in Arianna’s life, only for me to then push him away.

Sleeping in a separate bed is one thing, but keeping him away from her is another. I feel tears prick my eyes at how he clutches her close, swaying her gently. I feel like crap to think that I’ve not only hurt him and let him feel alone, but that Ari’s probably missed him. Our little girl has lost enough without me bringing my dysfunctional inability to communicate to her other father into it.

I sit up in bed, pushing the sheets away and stand, running a hand through my hair. He automatically looks at me, and then glances at Ari and hugs her close before quietly padding over to me, ready to defer and hand her over.

“No. She wants her other papa tonight.” I say quietly.

He pauses and I can make out a look of barely concealed surprise on his face in the dim light. “Okay,” he whispers.

“I didn’t mean to…I love seeing you two together, always have.” I step close enough to stroke a finger over he little cheek, ignoring how alert my whole body feels just standing close to him again. “She is so at home with you,” I murmur.

“Will…” he whispers.

 I back away. “I’m going to make some coffee, maybe do a little work, I can’t sleep.”

“I can―”

“No. You be with her.” I stand in the doorway, looking back at the perfect little family I’ve mistreated. “I didn’t mean to keep her away from you…if that’s what I’ve done.”

“No?”

“No.”

“You only meant to keep me away from you, then.” He says bravely.

I stare at him for a few moments; drumming my fingers quietly against the doorframe. “I’m gonna go make some coffee.” I mutter, leaving him standing there.

**oOo**

When Ari started to cut her first tooth we found that I was the one she would settle on.  Whenever Gabi or Will picked her up she would settle a little, but if she saw me then she’d reach for me and demand to be held by me.

I’ll be honest, that ranks up there as one of the best moments in my life.  It was the moment when I knew that she saw me as a parental figure, that I wasn’t alone in how I felt about her.

So she’d reach for me and I’d hold her and rock her and she’d often go to sleep like that, held in my arms or against my chest.  Gabi said it’s because she felt safe like that.  (Will then muttered he knew what it was like.)

It feels safe, holding her against me like this.  She’s already settling to sleep and I turn back to her crib, but the second I loosen my hold on her she’s alert and whimpering and clinging to my shirt in protest.

"It’s OK, baby girl, I got you," I whisper, my hand cradling the back of her head.  "I’m going nowhere.  I promise you."

I kiss the layer of fine, blonde hair on her head and she settles again, her hands still gripping my shirt even as she drifts back to sleep.  When I walk out of the bedroom the smell of coffee hits me, and Will turns.

"There’s enough if you…"

He doesn’t even finish the offer, just trails off and leaves it hanging.  Like so much is hanging between us at the moment.

"She doesn’t want to be put down," I explain when he looks at Ari.

"Oh, no, I wasn’t… I didn’t think…"

"That I was stealing her?" I finish quietly but sharply.  I reach around him and pour the coffee into another mug.  When I pull my arm back my bare skin brushes his and for a second there’s a spark between us.

"Sonny."

"I thought you’d done all your assignments."

"What?"

"You said you had work to do."

"Oh.  Yeah.  No, this is… this is something else."

I could press it and find out but I’m really just making small talk and he’d tell me if he wanted to.

Instead I take my mug of coffee and my sleeping child and I sit on the couch, carefully moving Ari so she’s a little more comfortable in my lap.

"I’m not," Will says as he walks over to the desk and powers up his laptop.

"Not what?" I ask.

"Keeping you away."

"You are though."  I pointedly look towards the door to what was Gabi’s room.

"I don’t mean to."

"Doesn’t change it."

"This is just really hard for me—"

"And it’s not for me?" I say a little too loudly, and Ari’s jostled a little.  I stop and hush her back to sleep as best I can with a mug of coffee in one hand.

I feel the mug being lifted away and I look over to where Will has come to join me - join us - on the couch.  He puts my mug on the table and then turns back, his gaze falling on Arianna.  When he puts a hand over her foot one of his fingers rests on my leg.

He doesn’t move it away.

"You blame me," I say quietly.  Not a question, not an accusation, just a statement.

"No," he replies, and that honestly surprises me.  "I blame myself.”

**oOo**

“Don’t get me wrong,” I say, my finger tracing the outline of Ari’s toes. “I wish you’d told me everything, but none of it is your fault.”

“Then why are we going on like this?”

For the first time in the last few weeks his brave façade fades and he doesn’t bother to hide his vulnerability from me. My hand moves away from Ari, my fingers now trailing ghost like along the arm that cradles our daughter.

“Because…” I swallow hard. “Because I loved a friend that didn’t exist, I feel like I’m mourning for a girl that died years ago.”

“She didn’t die, she screwed up.”

“That’s one hell of an understatement.” I say firmly.

“And there it is again,” he says quietly, sadly. “There’s that anger, and don’t say it’s for her, because it’s aimed at me.”

“I said I didn’t blame you, I didn’t say I wasn’t mad at you.”

“So mad that you won’t talk about it, won’t let me make amends…”

I stand up; ready to walk away from him but he snaps at me.

“Get _back_ here.”

But I don’t sit, I glance down at him, cradling our daughter, but I don’t want to sit, I don’t want to talk…

“I am so not kidding, Horton. Sit. Down.”

I may be angry but I don’t have a death wish, I sit back down.

“You don’t blame me but you’re too angry to talk to me. Explain that, please.”

“Fine.” I say between gritted teeth, careful to keep my voice down. “You make such a big deal about honesty and truth, Sonny, but you lied to me. To _me_ , Sonny.”

“I already told you why.”

“And I believe you, but it’s not good enough. Trust is everything, Sonny, but you decided to put her first before―”

“Don’t you dare, Will.” He says, sitting up carefully and then standing, heading towards Gabi’s room. “Don’t move,” he says over his shoulder.

I stand, ignoring his command and run a hand furiously through my hair. When he comes back he doesn’t hesitate to get in my space. He isn’t threatening by any means, but he isn’t willing to let me back out or retreat from a conversation that is a long time coming.

“You want to talk about priorities, Will? About putting Gabi first? How about we talk about your little show at the police station, hmm?”

“Excuse me?”

“I know you didn’t know she did it, _no_ one did, but just the idea of your ex getting in trouble was enough for you to put me and Ari on the back burner so that you could play hero and―”

“ _First_ of all,” I say, getting in his face. “I did no such thing. I was not _playing the hero_ , I was just sick of playing the coward. Something you and my family have forced me to do for long enough!”

“What the hell does that mean?!”

“I told you! I blame myself!”

“For _what_?” He says in exasperation.

“For everything!” I say, taking a step back and flinging my arms out before feeling my shoulders slump. “Gabi had zero self-worth because of _me_ , Sonny.”

He instantly closes his eyes, even going so far as to cover them with his hands as he turns away from me. “Oh god, not this, Will. Not again.” He faces me again, emphasizing his words with his hand pressing into my chest. “With the exception of Ari, you are not responsible for anybody’s well-being. I mean, I _love_ that you are so compassionate, but this borders on stupid, Will.”

“I’m stupid now?”

“Don’t do that,” he growls at me. “Don’t pick at my words to divert this fight, we’re talking about this!”

I stare at him for a few moments, furious, and then I sit. He crouches in front of me, his hands on my knees.

“She got over you, Will. I’m sorry to bruise your ego, but she moved on from you pretty damn quick.”

“Yeah, and she set her sights on Chad. We all know how that turned out.”

“That is her fuck up, not yours. It was stupid, shallow, and twisted. But guess what? It had nothing to do with you, and when she realized that I knew about this horrible, horrible thing she’d done her main concern was not me outing her to the cops, it was telling you.”

“What?”

“Because you’re her friend, the father of her child, and she _respects_ you.”

I’m quiet for a few moments and I clear my throat before speaking, my voice like gravel. “Yeah, well the feeling is no longer mutual.”

“See, I don’t believe that. That’s hurt and anger talking, not you.”

“It’s all me, Sonny, trust me.”

“No.” he shakes his head. “You don’t go from being willing to go to prison for someone, covering up their crime, a murder no less, to just hating them. You don’t just―”

“And that’s what you’re angry about, right?”

He stands up, pushing away from my knees to tower over me. “You’re damn right I’m angry, and I have every right to be! Not two months ago you promise me that we’d have forever, and then you go and give that forever away to someone else!”   He balls up his fists, his chest heaving. “Have you any idea how much that hurt? Being pushes aside like that?!”

I stand, breathing harsh, more furious than I’ve ever been in my entire life. Mad enough to scream, mad enough to punch someone. I grab the front of his vest and pull him forward into a harsh kiss.

I can feel his shock, how he sucks in his breath and just stands there, but it lasts only a few seconds before he’s pawing desperately at and kissing me back just as hard.

It’s like a live, exposed wire. I’ve been without this for three weeks and suddenly I have it again and it’s so strong, so potent that I have to break the kiss to pant harshly against his lips.

I keep close to him, my nose brushing against his and he just stands there, prisoner, his vest bunched up in my fists.

“You don’t get it,” I say harshly. “You think I did that for _her_? You think that I would leave you and Ari for _anyone_? Shame on you.”

“I-I don’t…”

“You brought a gun into the house, Sonny. You flat out told me that you wouldn’t hesitate, that you’d do anything for me.” I wet my lips, tempted to taste him again. “When I realized that the cops were about to search the Kiriakis mansion, the decision was…it was instant, it was just made.”

“What are you talking about?” He whispers.

“I thoughts they were coming after _you_. I did it for you.”

**oOo**

There have been a few moments in my life when it felt like someone had hit the pause button, when everything around me was just… waiting.

I remember those moments in utter clarity.

_Mom, Dad… I think… no.  I know.  I’m gay._

_Why don’t you let me be the judge of that?_

_I love you, Will.  I really love you._

_Nick’s not the father.  I am._

_So yes means…?_

So many moments and then here’s another one.

"Me?" I manage to ask, my chest still heaving.

"Yes, you," he says.  "I knew they were searching the mansion and I knew they would be looking for the gun.  And all I could think of was what if you had been seen?  Or what if you’d not wiped it down properly?  What if they figured out what you were going to do?  What if  _you_  were the one going to jail?”

"But—"

"You wanted to know, Sonny, here it is.  I walked in there and confessed to save  _you_.  Because the idea of you going to jail?  Of me losing you?  I couldn’t—”

"What about me losing you?" I retort.  "What about me having to watch you go to jail for something I knew you didn’t do?"

"Did you?"

"Of course I did!"  I step closer to him before taking his hands in mine.  My fingers find the ring on his left and I rub it gently.  "I know you," I say quietly.  "I know you… completely."

"Not enough to know why I was doing it though," he says, but there’s a soft laugh behind the words.

"Yeah, well, I didn’t know all the facts did I?  Bottom line.  I was watching the man I love more than anything else take himself away from me and I… I couldn’t deal with that."

"And that’s exactly why I did it," Will says, leaning forward and resting his forehead on mine.  "I can’t lose you, Sonny."

"You won’t," I say, "no matter how much you try to push me away."

"I just…  You say you know me and a few weeks ago I would have said the same thing about you, but you were keeping this from me and I didn’t know.  I didn’t see it."

"So what?  You think I’m keeping something else?" I ask, pulling back a little to look at him.  "You think I’d do that?"

"Three weeks ago I’d have said no.  But…"  He trails off and he can’t look at me.  "I can’t get my head around it, Sonny.  How I didn’t see it."

"Because there was nothing  _to_  see,” I say, hooking my finger under his chin and lifting his head a little.  ”It wasn’t about us.”

"It affected us though."

"I know, but hindsight is a wonderful thing," I say with a small shrug.  "She wasn’t that person anymore, Will.  After Ari was born we both realised that."

"How is what she did any different to what—?”

"Don’t even finish that sentence," I warn, "because once you’ve said it you can’t take it back.  You know, Will, you know how."

"The two people closest to me and I don’t know them," Will says.  "And that  _hurts_ , Sonny.”  He steps away from me and his hands slip from my grasp.  I want to grab him back but I wait.  ”I thought I knew you both but there are sides to you that I didn’t even see.  And while I may understand why you didn’t tell me the fact is that you should have.”

"OK, fine," I snap, "I should have told you.  And you should have spoken to me before you ran off and confessed to Hope.  And you should have trusted me a little more when Brent was trying to get me to go off on hikes instead of thinking that you were tying me down.  And you shouldn’t have slept with Gabi and you shouldn’t have lied to me about getting her pregnant.  But you did all that.

"And I shouldn’t have smashed Mom’s vase playing football inside the house when I was six, but I did.  I shouldn’t have blamed my brothers and I shouldn’t have let them take the punishment for me.  I shouldn’t have agreed to go out with Andrew’s sister when I was thirteen but I did, and I should have just been honest and said that it was him I wanted to spend time with.

"You and I both know that in this life we just stumble from one mistake to the next.  And most of them will be along the lines of forgetting to buy milk, or whose turn it is to cook dinner.  And when it comes to the big stuff then we have to make a decision in a second and we do what we think is right in that second.

"If I could go back?  Yes, I’d tell you.  Same as you’d go back and tell me about the baby the second Gabi told you.  But I have not held that over your head, Will, and I will not let you hold that over mine."

"You were the one who said we should be honest."

"And we are," I say.  "We are about the things that affect us, that impact on us.  And before you start going on about how this does affect us, the simple fact is, Will, that it doesn’t have to if we don’t want it to.  You can, if you want. Accept why I did what I did and we can start to move on."

"How do we move on from this?" Will asks.  "Tell me that, Sonny."

"We do it by getting on with our lives.  We do it by being there for Arianna and being there for each other.  We don’t put our marriage on hold; we don’t run away from each other, we—"

"Talk," he finishes for me, and in that second it was like we were how we were before.

"Yeah."

"OK," he says, holding out a hand to me.  "If that’s what you think we need to do…”

**oOo**

He looks at my hand but then moves away from me. I feel a moment of panic when he walks towards the front door, but then I immediately drop my hand when I see him bend to snag up the box containing Gabi’s things.

“No.” I say sharply. “No, you said we can move on?” I gesture ta the box. “Then that’s a part of it.”

He sets it down on the sofa and then does the unexpected; he pulls me into his arms and holds me. Just holds me. “Sonny…” I try to say sternly, but to my horror my voice comes out shaky and weak.

“I think I know what this really boils down to, you said as much already…”

“What?” I whisper, still not quite hugging him back.

“I know you’re angry, I know you feel betrayed by both of us, but…baby, she was your best friend.” He loosens his hold on me enough to take my face gently between his hands. “You’re sad that her life is going to be a difficult one. You’re sad because you won’t see her again out of that place. You’re sad because you couldn’t do anything to stop it.”

I can’t be brave anymore, I can’t even hold onto my anger. Not when he’s that close and looking into my eyes, forcing me to feel everything I desperately don’t want to feel. I feel my face crumble, I squeeze my eyes shut and try to feebly pull away, but he pulls me right back into his arms just as the first sob makes its way out of my throat.

I clutch him desperately, my face hidden against his neck as he holds me both tenderly but as firmly as I need to be held, and he murmurs to me softly, just nonsense words. “Sonny…” I choke out. “She’s so much more than this, but no one’s going to remember her that way…”

“No, they won’t.”

I look up at him, hurt, when he says this. But then he gently cups my face again. “Unless we remind them of who she really was. We tell them to forget the weak, silly girl that hired a stalker. We remind them that Nick latched onto her and trapped her, and then we remind them of Gabi Hernandez, the mother. Because that’s who she really was, that was her at her best.”

He swipes his thumb over my cheek, wiping away my tears, and I nod my head.

“We’re not going to throw away her things; we’re not going to pretend she doesn’t exist. That’s not going to make the pain you’re feeling go away, baby.”

“I know,” I whisper, because I know he’s right, and I’m thankful to him for being brave enough to say it to me when no one else would.

“We’re going to go through her things, okay? We’re going to make her room into a nursery; we’re going to buy one of those small beds with railings for when Ari’s bigger, and we’re going to pull out all the things in this box that Ari is going to want when she’s older. Gabi’s perfume, some clothes, makeup, photos….just so that she can build up an idea of who her mother is.”

“I don’t know if I can do that just yet.”

“Well then I’m going to store that” he says, lifting his chin over at the box, “…until you can. Then we’ll do it together, alright?”

“Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me, you’re mine to take care of, remember?”

I nod my head and he kisses me again, gently this time.

“Come on,” he says, and lifts the box to cradle in one arm, and then leads me by the hand to what was Gabi’s room.

I watch him as he stores the box in the wardrobe, and then he turns to me. He glances at Gabi’s bed, and then at me, like he’s asking me something.

“No.” I say immediately. “I want to come home.”

I don’t know why I said that, I just meant that I wanted to go back to our room, that I was sick of being apart from him, but he smiles a broken, relived smile, and pulls me back into his arms. I hug him back because I sense that he needs it now just as much as I do.

“I love you.” I whisper into his ear.

“I know, I love you.”

We look in the crib and check on Ari before heading off to our own room, and we’re climbing into bed when I take his hand, making him look at me.

“At the station and in the papers…they keep saying how I tried to sacrifice myself, and then what with bringing up when I was shot trying to save Nick, all that garbage…”

“Yeah?” He asks gently.  

“I just want you to know, I am never, ever doing anything like that again.”

He begins to smile but I squeeze his hand. “I’m serious. No one is going to take the forever that I promised to you away. I don’t care who they are. You and Ari…that’s it. Only you two. Everyone else is just going to have to take care of themselves.”

He smiles, the type of smile I’ve missed, and then pulls me close, into his kiss. “Thank you. Thank you. That’s all I want; you, me and Ari, and our little forever.”

“It’s yours,” I whisper, just as I push him down onto the bed.

 

 


End file.
